eternal life? What does it mean?

[Tombo]

I just read the Bible and I must say I'm very confused. For example what does the term "eternal Life"  mean? It is said that one will attain eternal Life tru Jesus. I don't get it. Does the Christian believe that there is no Reicarnation? What happens to the People don't do not know Jesus, will they vanish after Death? How does the Christ picture that eternal life? Jumbing around in paradise forever singing? Sounds kind of Boring...............

Can somebody explain?

[Neutrino4344]

Good question I'm glad to answer it since I am christian. Yes their is no such thing as reincarnation, its a false doctrine from men. Rely on Jesus as your strength and joy in life. The term eternal life means you live for ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and endlessly,I CAN NOT explain how heaven is actually like but the next best thing is to read biblical prophecies as well as NDE reports,and paradise(heaven)is not boring! "And this is the testimony:God has given us eternal life, he who has the son(Jesus) has life,he who does not have the son of God does not have life"---1 John 5:11-12. Hes the only way to a peaceful abundant life filled with love,hope,peace,joy,healing,true success and contentment plus may more things. Admit that you're a sinner... pray this like you mean it

"Lord Jesus, I confess that I am a sinner and I deserve to go to hell, but you took my place on the cross, I trust in you and now give everything up to you, in Jesus name,Amen.If you prayed that you now have a home in heaven and the spirit of God lives in you,get in a good bible based church and keep Jesus first in your life, GOOD LUCK!

[Tombo]

2 questions

-how do you explain people that can access earlier lives tru hypnosis?

-what happens with people that die without praying to Jesus? lets for example take some  people living in th rain forest in Amazonia that never heard of Jesus

[J.K.]

Biblical Support for Reincarnation
http://reluctant-messenger.com/images/reincarnation-bible.gif

Early Church History - Pope Arrested for Believing in Reincarnation
http://reluctant-messenger.com/reincarnation-pope.htm

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Hey Tombo..

With regard to 'eternal life' it can be said that all religions, not just Christianity, fall into two schools of thought.  One seeks victory of the ego everlasting while the other seeks self-forgetfullness.  Both viewpoints can be seen as eternal life since forgetfullness of the individuated self does not represent the end of life for those who ascribe to that idea but rather simply the end of maya or the illusion of seperatness.

I should add also that there is ample room in Christianity to follow the later.

Two quotes:

He who seeks to save his 'self' shall lose it, but he who gives up his 'self' for my sake shall find it.

Both read the bible day and night,
but thou readst black while  I read white
- William Blake

Cheers!

[MindFreak]

Neutrino, you should not corrupt Tombo's mind with such nonsense. Christianity is a false doctrine from men.

[Tombo]

Tombo's mind is not easy to corrupt, don't worry about it

[Neutrino4344]

"Neutrino, you should not corrupt Tombo's mind with such nonsense. Christianity is a false doctrine from men."


People nowadays are confused, they refuse to listen to the truth. But when its presented they love presenting false arguments to prove the truth wrong. Its like saying 1+1 isn't two, their ignorance abounds them and hold them bondage from the truth which is Jesus. Not your mind mind freak you need to grow up and find the truth and planted in your heart because Jesus lived,died,arose and coming again so watch out! Just like Jesus' cousin said "Repent, the kingdom of heaven is near". Hears a truthful bible verses to prove you're wrong mind freak, your ignorance will not prevail against truth which is once again Jesus.

Signs of the End of the Age
1Jesus left the temple and was walking away when his disciples came up to him to call his attention to its buildings. 2"Do you see all these things?" he asked. "I tell you the truth, not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down."
3As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to him privately. "Tell us," they said, "when will this happen, and what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?"

4Jesus answered: "Watch out that no one deceives you. 5For many will come in my name, claiming, 'I am the Christ,[a]' and will deceive many. 6You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 7Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places. 8All these are the beginning of birth pains.

9"Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13but he who stands firm to the end will be saved. 14And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

15"So when you see standing in the holy place 'the abomination that causes desolation,' spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand— 16then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 17Let no one on the roof of his house go down to take anything out of the house. 18Let no one in the field go back to get his cloak. 19How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! 20Pray that your flight will not take place in winter or on the Sabbath. 21For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now—and never to be equaled again. 22If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened. 23At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or, 'There he is!' do not believe it. 24For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and miracles to deceive even the elect—if that were possible. 25See, I have told you ahead of time.

26"So if anyone tells you, 'There he is, out in the desert,' do not go out; or, 'Here he is, in the inner rooms,' do not believe it. 27For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. 28Wherever there is a carcass, there the vultures will gather.

29"Immediately after the distress of those days
  " 'the sun will be darkened,
     and the moon will not give its light;
  the stars will fall from the sky,
     and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.'[c]

30"At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. 31And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.

32"Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. 33Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it[d]is near, right at the door. 34I tell you the truth, this generation[e] will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. 35Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.

The Day and Hour Unknown
36"No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,[f] but only the Father. 37As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.
42"Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. 43But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. 44So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.

45"Who then is the faithful and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his household to give them their food at the proper time? 46It will be good for that servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. 47I tell you the truth, he will put him in charge of all his possessions. 48But suppose that servant is wicked and says to himself, 'My master is staying away a long time,' 49and he then begins to beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. 50The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. 51He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
---Matthew 24

[MindFreak]

Neutrino what is the point of posting those passages? And how exactly do they prove Im wrong?
You blindly follow some book simply because the book itself tells you to and yet you call me ignorant. If thats not irony I dont know what is. It seems like you have no thoughts of your own, only what the bible tells you to think. The definition of a closed mind.

[gdo]

'Eternal life' is the knowledge that you have just that.  You have it now, even if you do not have a direct perception of it.  We all do.

Principle is not limited by precedent.  Nor is it limited to a tribal interpretation or cult or religion.  Each religion was based to serve a specific group or tribe in history.  The tribes have changed, the groups of people have changed, and religions spring up and die away.  Principles do not die they are only re-interpreted.  Knowledge of eternal life surpasses the temporary and the precedents.

[James S]

That's a good reply gdo!

I like your thoughts here - the principle doesn't change just because our beliefs do. It remains a universal truth despite how we may percieve it.

As to Neutrino's well rehearsed recital of the overly cliche'd "End Times" waffle:
1) people have been expecting these end times and seeing the "prophesies" coming true since these texts were written nearly two millennia ago.
2) how do you know it hasn't already happened?

Did you know that the phrase "weeping and gnashing of teeth" (or wailing depending on translation) appears seven times in the New Testament?
Now try and convince me that these are not fear based doctrines.

Why couldn't the New Testament encourage people instead with phrases like "where there will be laughing and enjoyment of life"?

:crazy3:  
James.

[Beth]

IMO the phrase 'Eternal Life' means nothing without a whole philosophy to support its implications.  Unfortunately, Christianity does not provide a very strong support for such a grand idea.   One such philosophy would include the idea of 'consciousness' as being infinite, and we are all a part of that consciousness, whether we are currently in a body or not; ergo, we are all infinite by inclusion.  There are more philosophies that include 'eternal life' but most of them (including the one I just mentioned) are pretty detailed modes of thought.

Unfortunately, most religions are usually so "physically" agenda driven that they have just 'plopped metaphysical end results in there' and left them to be at least taken for granted without explanation, or at most pondered by a seeking mind!!  If you are still interested, check out books on 'consciousness' and see where that search takes you.  

Peace,
Beth

[Stookie]

To me, eternal means "forever" or "infinite". And infinity exists outside of space/time. So "eternal life" would be existing in a state of consciousness that exists outside of the physical/space/time.

[Tombo]

Thanks for the replies although to be honest I still have no clue what eternal Life means as used in the Bible. I mean, sure I can come up with nice concepts what it could mean, but I wanna know what the Christs believe it means. As I understood the Bible, eternal Life is achieved thru Jesus, so if it would be a universal principle (we are all consciousness etc) then I wonder why I must achieve it thru Jesus (Since we have it anyway)?

Neutrino: I do not have very good opinion about the Bible (I believe it contains mostly stories about Human-Alien interaction that have been misinterpreted). So if you wanna make any progress you rather answer me questions then quote pages of this 2000 year old (likely) wrongly translated Book. Because otherwise I start to assume that your IQ is pretty low.

[Ryuji]

Tombo.

i think its more 'Like Jesus' and not 'Through Jesus' if you ask me
I'm sure why buts my feeling.

James S - interesting point never thought about it that way.
Gnashing of teeth...  - hope the used callgate hehe for strong teeth for all that Gnashing  

eternal life, you might get nightmares from the bible bout that - used to get those after I've moved away from Christianity to more open minded i didn't have those 'gnashing' and demons take over the world dreams anymore

but for Eternal Life. i think that would be when you 'integrate' with god again after you have become pure through all your trails in your lives

blessings,
Ryu